On August 29, the United Arab Emirates carried out a series of airstrikes on forces loyal to the Saudi-backed government of Yemen. The strikes reportedly killed or wounded over 300 people. The UAE said that the targets were some “terrorist militias”. However, the Saudi-backed government claimed that the UAE targeted its troops in Aden and Zinjibar supporting forces of the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council. This incident became the first time when the UAE provided STC units with a direct military support in their clashes with Saudi-backed forces.

An intense fighting between UAE- and Saudi-backed forces were ongoing across southern Yemen, especially in the city of Aden, almost entire August. In the first half of September, the intensity of clashes decreased. Nonetheless, the conflict within the Saudi-UAE-led coalition remains unresolved.

Essentially, the UAE and forces it backs are shifting focus from fighting against the Houthis, to fighting against the Saudi-backed government, further widening the rift. Taking into account that STC units are the most military capable part of coalition-backed troops, this undermines the already low chances of the coalition to achieve a military victory over the Houthis.

Interests and vision of the UAE and Saudi Arabia in the Middle East have been in conflict for a long time. Nonetheless, this tendency became especially obvious in 2019. The decline of influence of the House of Saud in the region and inside Saudi Arabia itself led to logical attempts of other regional players to gain a leading position in the Arabian Peninsula. The main challenger is the UAE and the House of Maktoum.

Contradictions between Saudi Arabia and the UAE turned into an open military confrontation between their proxies in Yemen. Since August 29, Saudi Arabia has provided no symmetric answer to the UAE military action against its proxies. It seems that the Saudi leadership has no will or distinct political vision of how it should react in this situation. Additionally, the Saudi military is bogged in a bloody conflict in Yemen and struggles to defend its own borders from Houthi attacks.

The UAE already gained an upper hand in the standoff with Saudi Arabia in the economic field. This motivates it for further actions to expand its influence in the region.

Yemeni drones have hit two oil facilities of Saudi Arabia’s state oil giant Aramco in the country’s east, causing huge fires before dawn on Saturday.

A spokesman for Saudi Arabia’s interior ministry said in a statement that the attacks targeted two Aramco factories in Abqaiq and Khurais.

The statement did not identify the source of the attacks, but Yemen’s Houthi movement later claimed responsibility in an announcement on Al Masirah TV.

The movement’s military spokesman General Yahya Sare’e said 10 drones were deployed against the sites in Abqaiq and Khurais, and pledged to widen the range of attacks on Saudi Arabia.

“This was one of the largest operations which our forces have carried out deep inside Saudi Arabia. It came after careful intelligence and cooperation with honorable and free people inside Saudi Arabia,” he said without elaboration.

Home to much of Saudi Arabia’s oil production, Eastern Province has seen bouts of unrest since 2011 when protesters emboldened by the Arab Spring uprisings took to the streets.

Houthi fighters and their allies in Yemen’s army have carried out similar attacks in recent months in retaliation for the kingdom’s airstrikes in the impoverished nation and its crippling economic siege on the country.

The incident comes nearly a month after Saudi Aramco’s oil facilities in Shaybah, the kingdom’s largest strategic oil reserve near the UAE border, were targeted by Yemeni forces in a major drone attack.

Yemeni forces also launched a successful raid on a major pipeline spanning the kingdom in May.

Sare’e on Saturday pledged to widen the range of retaliatory attacks on Saudi Arabia.

“As long as the invasion and siege continues, we promise the Saudi establishment that our future operations will expand further and become more painful,” he said.

“There is no solution before the Saudi establishment other than halting attacks and putting an end to the siege,” Sare’e added.

The latest attacks also come as Saudi Arabia, the world’s top crude exporter, accelerates preparations for a much-anticipated initial public offering of Aramco.

The IPO forms the cornerstone of a program envisaged by de facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, a son of King Salman, to replenish the kingdom once buoyant reserves which have dwindled in stride with falling oil prices and the protracted Yemen war.

The war has turned into a quagmire for Riyadh, with Yemeni forces increasingly using sophisticated weaponry in retaliatory attacks.

The UAE, Saudi Arabia’s most notable partner in the conflict, recently announced the gradual withdrawal of its troops from Yemen, largely because it believes the war has become “unwinnable”, according to US reports.

Yemeni forces regularly target positions inside Saudi Arabia in retaliation for the Saudi war, which began in March 2015 in an attempt to reinstall the country’s Riyadh-allied former regime and crush the popular Houthi Ansarullah movement.

The Western-backed military aggression, coupled with a naval blockade, has killed tens of thousands of Yemenis, destroyed the country’s infrastructure and led to a massive humanitarian crisis.

In its statement, Yemen’s Armed forces claimed responsibility for the drone operation on two oil facilities of Saudi Arabia’s state oil giant Aramco in the country’s east, which caused huge fires before dawn on Saturday.

The spokesman for Yemeni Armed Forces, Brigadier General Yahya Saree, said in a statement on Saturday, “The Air Force carried out an operation – dubbed ‘Operation Balance of Deterrence 2’ – of a 10-drone squadron on two Saudi Aramco plants in Abqaiq and Khurais”.

General Saree said that the operation was accurate and direct, pointing out that “the targeting of Abqaiq and Khurais plants comes within the framework of the legitimate and natural response to the crimes of the Saudi aggression”.

The Yemeni Armed forces spokesman promised the regime in Saudi Arabia, “that our future operations will expand and be more painful as long as its aggression and blockade continue”.

Relatedly, Yemen’s Minister of Tourism Ahmed al-Ali in an interview with the Lebanon-based Arabic language al-Mayadeen TV assured that no civilians were harmed saying, “we have not targeted any civilian targets in Saudi Arabia; strategic facilities were targeted”.

The incident comes nearly a month after Saudi Aramco’s oil facilities in Shaybah, the kingdom’s largest strategic oil reserve near the UAE border, were targeted by Yemeni forces in a major drone operation.

Drone Attacks Spark Fire at 2 Saudi Aramco Oil Plants

Drones have hit two oil facilities of Saudi Arabia’s state oil giant Aramco in the country’s east, causing huge fires before dawn on Saturday.

A spokesman for Saudi Arabia’s interior ministry said in a statement that the attacks targeted two Aramco factories in Abqaiq and Khurais.

The statement did not identify the source of the attack, but Ansarullah revolutionaries and their allies in Yemen’s army have carried out similar attacks in recent months in retaliation for the kingdom’s airstrikes in the impoverished nation.

Meanwhile, the spokesman for Yemeni Armed Forces, Brigadier General Yahya Saree announced that Yemeni forces will be issuing a statement in the coming hours about details of the largest Yemeni Air Forces operation into the depth of Saudi Arabia.

The incident comes nearly a month after Saudi Aramco’s oil facilities in Shaybah, the kingdom’s largest strategic oil reserve near the UAE border, were targeted by Yemeni forces in a major drone attack.

Yemeni forces also launched a successful raid on a major pipeline spanning the kingdom in May.

The Saudi-led war has so far turned into a quagmire for Riyadh, with Yemeni forces increasingly using sophisticated weaponry in retaliatory operations. The UAE, Saudi Arabia’s most notable partner in the conflict, has consequently announced the gradual withdrawal of its troops from country, largely because it believes the war has become “unwinnable”, according to US reports.

An official confirmation by the Trump administration of it holding discreet talks with Yemen’s Houthi rebels indicates a realization in Washington that its military intervention in the Arab country is an unsalvageable disaster requiring exit.

There are also reports of the Trump administration urging the Saudi rulers to engage with the Houthis, also known as Ansarullah, in order to patch up some kind of peace settlement to the more than four-year war. In short, the Americans want out of this quagmire.

Quite a turnaround. The US-backed Saudi coalition has up to now justified its aggression against the poorest country in the Arab region with claims that the rebels are Iranian proxies. Now, it seems, Washington deems the Houthi “terrorists” worthy of negotiations.

This follows a similar pattern in many other US foreign wars. First, the aggression is “justified” by moralistic claims of fighting “communists” or “terrorists” as in Vietnam and Afghanistan. Only for Washington, after much needless slaughter and destruction, to reach out to former villains for “talks” in order to extricate the Americans from their own self-made disaster.

Talks with the Houthis were confirmed last week by US Assistant Secretary of Near East Affairs David Schenker during a visit to Saudi Arabia.

“We are narrowly focused on trying to end the war in Yemen,” said Schenker. “We are also having talks to the extent possible with the Houthis to try and find a mutually accepted negotiated solution to the conflict.”

In response, a senior Houthi official Hamid Assem was quoted as saying: “That the United States says they are talking to us is a great victory for us and proves that we are right.” However, he declined to confirm or deny if negotiations were being held.

You have to almost admire the effrontery of the American government. Notice how the US diplomat says “we are focused on ending the war” and “a mutually acceptable solution”.

As if Washington is some kind of honest broker trying to bring peace to a country stricken by mysterious violence.

The war was launched by the US-backed Saudi coalition, including the United Arab Emirates, in March 2015, without any provocation from Yemen. The precipitating factor was that the Houthis, a mainly Shia rebel group aligned with Iran, had kicked out a corrupt Saudi-backed dictator at the end of 2014. When he tucked tail and fled to exile in Saudi capital Riyadh, that’s when the Saudis launched their aerial bombing campaign on Yemen.

The slaughter in Yemen over the past four years has been nothing short of a calamity for the population of nearly 28 million people. The UN estimates that nearly 80 per cent of the nation is teetering on hunger and disease.

A UN report published last week explicitly held the US, Britain and France liable for complicity in massive war crimes from their unstinting supply of warplanes, munitions and logistics to the Saudi and Emirati warplanes that have indiscriminately bombed civilians and public infrastructure. The UN report also blamed the Houthis for committing atrocities. That may be so, but the preponderance of deaths and destruction in Yemen is due to American, British and French military support to the Saudi-led coalition. Up to 100,ooo civilians may have been killed from the Western-backed blitzkrieg, while the Western media keep quoting a figure of “10,000”, which magically never seems to increase over the past four years.

Several factors are pressing the Trump administration to wind down the Yemen war.

The infernal humanitarian conditions and complicity in war crimes can no longer be concealed by Washington’s mendacity about allegedly combating “Iran subversion” in Yemen. The southern Arabian Peninsula country is an unmitigated PR disaster for official American pretensions of being a world leader in democratic and law-abiding virtue.

When the American Congress is united in calling for a ban on US arms to Saudi Arabia because of the atrocities in Yemen, then we should know that the PR war has been lost. President Trump over-ruled Congress earlier this year to continue arming the Saudis in Yemen. But even Trump must at last be realizing his government’s culpability for aiding and abetting genocide is no longer excusable, even for the most credulous consumers of American propaganda.

After four years of relentless air strikes, which has become financially ruinous for the Saudi monarchy and its precocious Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who conceived the war, the Houthis still remain in control of the capital Sanaa and large swathes of the country. Barbaric bombardment and siege-starvation imposed on Yemen has not dislodged the rebels.

Not only that but the Houthis have begun to take the war into the heart of Saudi Arabia. Over the past year, the rebels have mounted increasingly sophisticated long-range drone and ballistic missile attacks on Saudi military bases and the capital Riyadh. From where the Houthis are receiving their more lethal weaponry is not clear. Maybe from Lebanon’s Hezbollah or from Iran. In any case, such supply if confirmed could be argued as legitimate support for a country facing aggression.

No doubt the Houthis striking deep into Saudi territory has given the pampered monarchs in Riyadh serious pause for thought.

When the UAE – the other main coalition partner – announced a month ago that it was scaling back its involvement in Yemen that must have rattled Washington and Riyadh that the war was indeed futile.

The defeat is further complicated by the open conflict which has broken out over recent weeks between rival militants sponsored by the Saudis and Emiratis in the southern port city of Aden. There are reports of UAE warplanes attacking Saudi-backed militants and of Saudi force build-up. A war of words has erupted between Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. There is strong possibility that the rival factions could blow up into a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and the UAE, supposed coalition allies.

Washington has doubtless taken note of the unstoppable disaster in Yemen and how its position is indefensible and infeasible.

Like so many other obscene American wars down through the decades, Washington is facing yet another ignominious defeat in Yemen. When the US starts to talk about “ending the war” with a spin about concern for “mutual peace”, then you know the sordid game is finally up.

Rocketry Force of the Army and Popular Committees on Friday targeted Najran Regional Airport by a ballistic missile, Badr 1. It is the second operation in which the army targeted the airport, and the fourth operation targeting the Saudi depth within 24 hours.

The Brigadier confirmed that the missile hit its target with high accuracy, and caused disruption of air navigation at the airport.

“The operation is in accordance with international humanitarian law and its customary rules, where all necessary and preventive measures have been taken to protect civilians,” the spokesman said.

This is the second operation targeting Najran Regional Airport in 24 hours, in addition to two operations which were carried out by the Air Force targeting the airport and an Air Base in Aseer.

The Rocketry Force of the Army and the Popular Committees, on Thursday, launched a batch of missiles, Badr 1, at the airport and the Saudi duty force in Najran and other military targets.

After targeting Najran airport, the Air Force of the Army and Popular Committees carried out several attacks against King Khalid Air Base in Khamis Mushait, in Aseer, with a number of drones, Qasif 2K.

At dawn on Friday, the Air Force carried out attacks by a number of drones, Qasif 2K, on an important military target, in Khamis Mushait of Aseer, according to the Armed Forces spokesman, Yahya Sare’e.

It should be noted that the Yemeni operations in the Saudi depth come within the framework of legitimate response to the US-Saudi crimes against the Yemeni people.